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Post by gardenlarder on Feb 19, 2015 5:36:36 GMT 10
It annoys me when I go to a market and see sellers with terribly presented plants and trying to sell them for 'normal' retail prices. These are not old ladies who decide to pull up a couple of their irises for the local church sale but those who seem to be trying to set up a regular 'business' at the markets. Please everyone: - Use nice looking labels, not ice-cream sticks
- Spend money on nice looking pots, not toilet roll inserts. The money is an investment, sell less and make them look good at the start so you can get a better profit to sell more. You want to be eco friendly? most plastic pots nowdays are recycled.
- Use quality potting mix, not backyard soil
- If the plant doesn't look good and healthy don't take it to the market
- Behave in a professional way and take time to plan your stall set-up.
- Know everything about every plant you sell
- Don't undercut others on price, that brings everyone undone. Be proud of your plants and price accordingly
Of course this also applies to home nurseries. Here is a great (American) article on selling produce at farmers markets that would have the same advice for selling plants: www.newfarm.org/features/0504/farmmarkets/ |
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Post by mountains gardener on Feb 24, 2015 10:21:49 GMT 10
I use recycled pots from a local nursery they look pretty good.I am writing plant descriptions and laminate them however I have to fix them somehow to a stick...
I plan to cut hardboard into small pieces paint it with blackboard paint to write signs like "Mediterranean herbs" and I want to make an a-frame sign.
I think it is very good to have a webpage with the plants you sell, especially how the plant behaves in your climate.
Very important to me is always have the correct latin name and variety name.
When buying apples at the markets I expect that they are weighing down, same applies to plants, be generous.
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Post by reed on Feb 28, 2015 2:22:41 GMT 10
We break quite a few of those rules. For example we basically bare root or root ball things like iris or peony. roots/moist paper/plastic/ cover material. With the last being neat and clean. It might be burlap, it might be gift wrap. We often don't use labels, instead we make a nice sign with a picture of the plant and the price. We keep copies of planting and care instructions for each plant separate and give them out at time of the sell.
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Post by reed on Feb 28, 2015 2:34:06 GMT 10
We will also undercut competitors or I guess you could look at that way. Take iris for example again. If I have a nice start that cost me pretty much zero to produce, all I had to do was spend a short time digging cleaning and packaging and I put a price of $2.50 and someone else has one maybe better, as good, or poorer in a fancy pot with expensive soil and they want $9.00 for it there isn't anything I can do about it.
What has happened more than once is the $9.00 guy just buys ALL of ours and we go home. He puts them in the fancy pots with the fancy dirt and makes a nice profit and we say YEA! We'll see him again next time.
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Post by mountains gardener on Mar 2, 2015 20:03:08 GMT 10
How do you make your nice sign?
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Post by reed on Mar 2, 2015 23:50:12 GMT 10
Here all the politicians plaster the roads with campaign signs every election that are made of that nice durable plastic like stuff. By law they have to remove them right after the election but they rarely do so I consider them fair game and swipe them. I use them for lots of things, on some the lettering peels off and on others you need to paint to keep it from showing through. Then I just print my sign and use heavy duty clear packing tape to basically laminate it to the plastic. Ends up very durable and quite waterproof.
I can't print a single piece of paper large enough so I just do my signs sections.
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